thanks for watching we appreciate your time. hope to see you again at 6:00. tonight on "world news," seismic rumble. stunning wins for tea party candidates. the real contest for november begins. giant battle. are americans about to fight the fight that will decide the war in afghanistan? modern family. what do you think makes a family? surprising news today about what your neighbors believe. and, losing weight. news today about another weight loss drug. dr. richard besser with the latest on what works and what doesn't. and, climb every mountain. someone who shows us all how to win at life, every single day. it's the american heart. good evening.

and it is right there behind me, the u.s. capitol. and 48 days now until the november congressional elections, which is shaping up to be a lively and crackling political showdown. last night, tea party candidates scored huge wins in several states, upending the predictions, and this morning, the democrats are marshaling forces. and on the republican side, karl rove is expressing surprise. jon charl karl has been running down results for us and is here tonight. good evening, jon. >> reporter: diane, the republican leadership is just stunned by what happened last night in delaware, and now they are scrambling to get control of a movement that seems to be taking over their party. >> you betcha. >> reporter: republican leaders had called her a fraud, a liar and unelectable. but now they have to call christine o'donnell republican nominee for senate. >> i didn't count on the establishment to win the primary. i'm not counting on them to win

the general. i'm counting on the voters of delaware. >> reporter: privately, republican leaders say o'donnell's victory means they can't win in delaware and probably can't win control of the senate either. but the only senator who supported o'donnell says his party's leadership had it coming. >> i've been in the majority with republicans who didn't have principles and we embarrassed ourselves and lost credibility in front of the country. frankly, i'm at a point where i'd rather lose fighting for the right cause than win fighting for the wrong cause. >> reporter: now, party leaders are trying to make nice. chairman michael steele endorsed her, and so did the senate republican leadership. but republican guru karl rove continued to attack o'donnell even after she won. >> why did she mislead voters about her college education? how come it took nearly two decades to pay her college bills so she could get her college degree? how did she make a living? >> reporter: on abc's "top line," the head of the group tea party express shot back.

>> karl should stay out of it. these seats don't belong to the republican party or to these states, the state parties. they belong to the people. >> reporter: the tea party movement has now swept aside gop establishment candidates in seven states. democrats believe this has produced outside the mainstream republican nominees who will be easier to beat in november. maybe -- but don't count on it. >> if the democrats think that the tea party folks are mad at republicans, just wait until they see what happens when november 2nd comes around, and they get a shot at the democratic incumbents. >> reporter: last night, gop leaders told us they wouldn't spend a dime to help o'donnell, because they didn't think she could win. but today, diane, the national republican senatorial committee sent a peace offering to o'donnell, in the form of a $42,000 check to her campaign. >> i want to get this straight, jon, because o'donnell is another sarah palin-endorsed candidate, big-time, and karl rove is doing battle now with sarah palin over this? >> reporter: there you go.

palin versus rove. get your tickets. >> all right, well, let's turn now to george stephanopoulos, who is standing by in new york. so, george, how about it? tea party getting ready to go national? what are you seeing out there? >> reporter: well, they may. and democrats began the day kind of excited, because they think o'donnell is going to be easy to beat in delaware. but what settled in over the day is how deep and strong this wave is. right now, the number of people who are going to vote in november who support the tea party is growing. take a look at the numbers. 44% of likely voters have a favorable opinion of the tea party. nearly a quarter of likely voters, more than a quarter, have a strongly favorable opinion of the tea party. and take a closer look at what they believe. 92% believe that democrats in congress don't deserve re-election. 96%, almost impossible to get numbers that high, disapprove of the job the president is doing. so, going back to what senator cornyn said, these voters may not like republicans, but they

hate the democrats. >> so, 48 days now for the democrats to try to match passion for passion. what's the strategy? >> reporter: well, you saw the president come out today and try and rile up democrats again on this whole issue of tax cuts for the wealthy and the republicans insisting on those and blocking tax cuts for the middle class. in one sense, they're going to - over issues like tha demcratgain but then they're also hoping, in some of these local races, like delaware, with christine o'donnell, like nevada with sharron angle, that they can portray these candidates as outside of the mainstream and win the election on the ground. >> well, we will all be watching all across this country, as we say. it begins. 48 days to go. thanks to you both. and another headline from washington today. the topic was the modern era of sex danger and sex trafficking in america. fueled by giant internet shopping sites like craigslist. finally, a craigslist executive was summoned to answer for the

charges of creating an invitation to trafficking. here's pierre thomas. >> reporter: today, for the first time since craigslist censored its adult services, an executive from the company had to answer for its role in an epidemic of prostitution. some of it involving children. >> craigslist, we feel, has been one of the success stories in the critical fight against trafficking and child exploitation. >> reporter: craigslist's story? it's actually been figh online prostitution, evengh graphic ads had been appear on its pages and even though it had made more than $30 million from adult services lasto. alone. >> we have never been, never been a friendly place for criminal activity. >> reporter: some members of congress appeared skeptical. >> no amount of money is going to cause craigslist to reinstitute, in another name, this kind of site? >> i can't answer that directly, because i'm not directly involved in the decision-maki cp lasolved in the decision-maki cp >> yes. what i'm saying is, we do not have any intention to bring that

category back. >> reporter: even though craigslist supposedly shut down its adult services site, today, we still found some racy postings that some might consider close to prostitution. take this one for, quote, he ways,erin she calls herself, quote, a sexf i think you get the picture. today, members of congress were told that online services like craigslist have partially fueled child prostitution. helping make it far more pervasive than many americans realize. >> offered me $500 and, i don't know, i couldn't stop crying. >> reporter: an estimated 100,000 children now forced into prostitution. average age? only 13. the dilemma tonight, how to stop these crimes from migrating to other sites. pierre thomas, abc news, washington. and, up next, the countdown overseas to a battle that could determine the outcome of the nine-year war in afghanistan. in december 2001, right after 9/11, american troops took the taliban stronghold of kandahar and signaled triumph.

but tonight, they are preparing, because they have to try to do it again. we want to bring in martha raddatz, who is just back from afghanistan. martha, what are we expecting to happen now in the days ahead? >> reporter: i think you will see massive and sustained combat, but they're really trying to tamp down expectations. as you know, i was with the commander over there, david petraeus, and he kept saying, we don't want to build expectations for anything in afghanistan. but the reality is, this is a key battle in kandahar. they really have to be successful there. >> so expect it to be a long, slow, steady march? >> reporter: i think somewhat long and slow, and yet, as you know, they have to show success quickly. so, that's the hard part here. it's still a counterinsurgency campaign. that takes a long time. but they need short-term gains there. >> so, let me ask you, someone who just came back. we hear all these mixed views of whether the new strategy, the counterinsurgency is succeeding

or not. tell us what you saw. >> reporter: well, i think there's real concern, diane. i sensed it with general petraeus, they're concerned about certain parts of afghanistan, certainly kandahar. all of those surge troops are now in place. 30,000 troops. they have to show some progress, as you know. he said it's like watching paint dry sometimes. but in the coming weeks, you'll see some real strong combat. >> all right, martha raddatz, just back from afghanistan tonight, thank you. and we have a note now about the ongoing investigation into the mismarked graves at arlington national cemetery. the army today acknowledged that two people were buried in the wrong graves. those graves were exhumed last month after a worried army widow called when she heard about the reports of the mixups. these mistakes have been fixed, but the investigation continues. and, in connecticut, another wrenching day in court, in the home invasion case where a doctor lived through a brutal attack, but his wife and two daughters did not.

his wife had tried to signal to someone else that she was a hostage, and in danger. the 911 tapes are now telling the next part of that story, and here's andrea canning. >> reporter: after three long years, dr. william petit finally came face to face this week with stephen hayes, one of the two men accused of killing his wife and two daughters in a brutal 2007 home invasion. >> mostly focused on the questions that i was being asked. just try to do the best i could for my family. >> reporter: in court, petit endured the 911 call made by a teller in this bank where his wife jennifer, seen here on the surveillance video, was taken by her attackers. >> we have a lady who is in our bank right now who says that her husband and children are being held at their house. the people are in a car outside the bank. she is getting $15,000 to bring out to them. if the police are told they will kill the children and the husband. they have their faces covered. she is petrified. they told her they wouldn't hurt anybody if she got back there

with the money. she believes them. i think she's walking out now. >> reporter: she walked into the ultimate nightmare. hayes and his accomplice took her home where she was sexually assaulted. her two children were tied to their beds. her husband was tied to a pole in the basement. dr. petit managed to escape by untying himself and running to his neighbor's. so, why did it take 33 minutes for the police to arrive to the home, and why didn't they attempt to enter? the police said in court today they followed standard hostage procedure, by establishing a perimeter around the house, rather than entering. they captured them a short time later, after the suspects tried to break through a road block. but not before they had set fire to the house and killed the family. now, as the trial enters its fourth day, the jury continues to hear testimony that will determine whether the two suspects receive the death penalty. andrea canning, abc news, new haich, haven, connecticut. and still ahead on "world news," new research about what

constitutes the american family. how it's been changing, how it compares to yours. also, problems with a popular diet pill. what do they do to your body? and will anything work? and, the climber facing so many challenges, scaling 1,000-foot cliff, teaching us how to climb the mountains in our lives. the american heart. ♪ [ man ] if it was simply about money, every bank loan would be a guarantee of success. at ge capital, loaning money is the start of the relationship, not the end. i work with polaris every day. at ge capital, we succeed only when they do. whoo! awesome! yes! we've got to get you out of the office more often. ♪ my turn to drive. ♪ [ male announcer ] we asked zyrtec® users

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there is landmark research out tonight about an institution most of us are apart of. the american family. and not too long ago, a wife, a husband, two kids, that was the definition of the american family. but divorce, gay parents, unmarried couples with children, all that is changing what we think. so, researchers set out to determine, how do we define an american family today? here's john berman. ♪ >> reporter: there's the addams family, the first family, my family and the partridge family. ♪ i think i love you >> reporter: all called family, but what counts as family? >> what we find is that people are moving away from a traditional definition of family, and they're moving towards a modern definition of family. >> reporter: the "modern family" -- indeed -- comes in many combinations. nearly 100% of us agree, a husband, wife and kinds counts as a family. no kids, 92% say that's a family.

those kids make a difference. >> children provide this quote guarantee that move you to family status. >> reporter: for instance, an unmarried man and woman living together -- >> hey. >> hi. >> reporter: under 40% say that's a family. give them kids? it jumps to 83%. that's up 5% since 2003. a gay couple? 33% say that's a family. with kids? 64%. a 10% jump in just the last seven years. >> people right now are really re-evaluating their views about same sex couples. >> reporter: what about pets? more than half of us say they're in the family. but two guys living as roommates -- ♪ sorry felix. just 10% say they're family. in the end, when it comes to defining "family ties," and determining "family matters," you might say it's "all in the

family." because 60% of us now say if you consider yourself a family, you are a family. welcome. and hold on tight. john berman, abc news, new york. and, one more note about families. the cost of raising a child continues to rise. a typical family will spend nearly a quarter of a million dollars to raise a baby born last year until the age of 18. and that's an increase of 1.4% from 2007. and, by the way, it doesn't include college. so, where does the money go? for starters, a bedroom, $71,000. food, more than $35,000. same for education. and clothes will set you back $13,000. but as they say, the reason? priceless. and, still ahead, the vote here in washington on what to do about a popular diet pill. what does the pill do to your heart?

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in medical news tonight, a vote late today on the future of a diet pill that has been on the market for 13 years. a split decision by a panel inside the fda about whether to pull meridia off the market. we asked dr. richard besser to tell us why the great hope of diet pills seems to be struggling and does anything work? >> reporter: the concerns voiced today are just the latest chapter in a long quest for a safe and effective weight loss drug. more than 68% of adults are overweight or obese. a leading risk factor for diabetes and heart disease. a safe and effective weight loss pill could save lives, but has been an illusive thing for researchers. >> watch out. if someone is promising something that is so powerful, so magic that can cause you to lose weight, it probably has other consequences. >> reporter: but why has it been so difficult for scientists to find this magic combination? here's how it works. the chemicals that regulate appetite, called neurotransm

neurotransmitt neurotransmitters, also regular blood pressure, heart rate, mood and other critical body functions. scientists have so far been unable to create a drug that doesn't impact on other areas. surgery is still the treatment with the most clear ruments for obesity. but that comes with risk, as well. headlines were made this week about the fda approving two nonsorj call procedures to kill fat inside the body, including zeltiq, which freezes cells, causing them to self-destruct. however, it's important to note these treatments are for cosmetic purposes only. there's no data on how long it lasts and it is not effective for weight loss. tomorrow, a panel will consider yet another diet drug, lorquest, but the preliminary findings of the fda review are not encouraging chlgt for now, there's no easy way to lose weight and it comes down to diet and exercise. diane? >> diet and exercise, we always come back there. thank you, dr. richard besser. i'll see you in new york again tomorrow. but we are here tonight, at the newseum, the museum for

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and finally, and finally, it's an inspiration for every one of us, every single day. it's one of the greatest challenges in rock climbing, el capitan in yosemite national park. and for a climber with cerebral palsy, it's a lesson in matching a giant spirit to a gigantic american heart, and here's david muir. >> go, dude, you're on a blast off. >> reporter: and with that, he was off. stephen wampler of california, a husband and a father of two, has cerebral palsy. on sunday, he left his wheelchair to begin the climb of his life. >> steve, how's it going man? >> long, long day. seven hours climbing. >> reporter: steve is aiming to become the first person with cerebral palsy to climb the

famed el capitan in yosemite national park. he trained for more than a year. each draining pull of that rope bringing him five inches closer to the top. but it is a towering challenge. el capitan is not one empire state building, but two. >> that sun today was brutal. holy crap. >> reporter: and today, suspended more than 1,000 feet above ground, we called him. hello, steve? hey, it's david muir in new york. how are you? >> good, and you? >> reporter: i guess you're just kind of hanging out. >> kind of, if you want to call it that. >> reporter: he's been climbing and sleeping for three days now. another 650 feet? so, you're almost halfway there. >> yes. >> reporter: and none of this is surprising the woman who 15 years ago, became steve's wife. >> at first, i thought, i bet he's having a really hard life. i quickly learned that anything nothing could be further from the truth. >> reporter: steve has taught

everyone he knows disabilities don't have to limit you. the lesson, the tallest of all. your wife is going to see this on tv tonight. what do you want to say to her? >> i love you. and i can't wait to get up to the top. get off this rock. >> reporter: a laugh from the exhausted climber. still pulling himself up tonight. with so many of us now pulling for him. david muir, abc news, new york. >> simply amazing. and, if you want to send a message of encouragement to steve, or ask him a question, go to abcnews.com. he'll answer you when he's back on ground. for all of us in washington, more pain in san bruno. residents returned to see what is left. >> governor schwartzeneggar makes his first trip to the fire zone and is not pointing fingers but homeowners are. >> and who the shooter claims he was targeting.

>> a brand new way to move your household items. no van no, movers. wait until you can see this. 7 on your side is coming up. >> another difficult day for the people of san bruno. for the first time all of the residents would lost homes were allowed to see their burned out properties up close and salvage what they could. there were a few surprising successes. and as you can see this, safe appears to have survived the fire. >> the governor paid a advise writ to the disaster site where four people were killed and 37 homes destroyed on thursday. the governor has been on a trade mission to asia and went straight tt fire scene after landing at sfo this afternoon. before we can go deeper into these developments tonight. >> we're going to go to the bigger implication for all of us, safety of pg&e pipeline systems.